Alisha Leytem: Hello everyone. Welcome back to Unlock Your Well-being. I'm your host, Alisha Leytem, and we have a recurring special guest with us today. My husband, Michael. Leytem. Welcome, Michael.
Michael Leytem: Happy to be here again. I must have done something right last time. I say that every time.
Alisha Leytem: You do. I think that's literally what you say verbatim. Should we start over?
Michael Leytem: No, we're gonna keep it rolling. Let's go
Alisha Leytem: If you are tuning in for the first time you can check out some other episodes that Michael has been on with us, but a little bit of background for those of you who are new around here. Michael runs his leadership consulting company called Catching Leadership. And I have, as you guys know, my consulting company called Alisha Leytem Well-being.
We often partner together because well-being and leadership is really important, especially with the changing landscape of the workforce in the last few years. We actually have been working together on a project really all day today, right?
Michael Leytem: It's been a great collaboration, like Alisha said. I will just say this, being in the leadership development space for over 10 years, that there's always been a lot of emphasis on team dynamics, communication, providing feedback, coaching, all of its really, really good stuff. But there has been a very strong uptick in our clients wanting more mindfulness and wellbeing, and for both of us, like we've seen it as part of leadership for a very, very long time. But it's encouraging to see that there are organizations that are buying into marrying these two ideas together.
Alisha Leytem: Yeah. Well, they, they kind of have to, right? Since the last few years, everything has really accelerated this need for us to not only individually look at our own wellbeing and look at we are doing how we're leading ourselves. And the way we take care of ourselves and the way that we nurture our, our bodies, nurture our minds, how we're feeling in our mental health and our physical health, but also in the workforce, because how the workforce works impacts your individual wellbeing.
You can work on your own well-being all day long, but if the environment that you're in is hindering that then that will negatively impact you personally. So there's this really big understanding now of organizations saying, okay, we need to make these changes. And luckily there are a lot of organizations that are studying it immensely and finding what's working, what we can be doing, and how we can help solve for this.
What we wanna talk to you guys today about is something actually really exciting. Speaking of doing some work together, we ha are are going to be, well let you announce it. What are we doing?
Michael Leytem: We are co-hosting a mindfulness leadership retreat together June 15th through the 17th in the heart of the Driftless area, which is in Lafarge, Wisconsin. It is in an absolutely epic, beautiful remote area where there's these beautiful cabins and rolling hills in these limestone spring creeks and hiking and trees. And it's just a delight to truly get out of the hustle and bustle, unplug and work on some of these leadership and mindfulness techniques.
Alisha Leytem: I want to bring this back to what we were talking about, about the importance of prioritizing your own well-being, especially as leaders, because one thing that organizations need to understand is that the changes that you want to see in your well-being will come when the leaders are actually improving their own personal well-being.
They're the ones who have to lead by doing it and embodying it and becoming it. This retreat that we're co-facilitating together is an opportunity for leaders to escape the hustle and bustle and take a time out to reconnect with themselves and prioritize your wellbeing and doing this with the power of the healing benefits of nature.
If you guys have tuned in before, or if you read my book, the Six G.O.L.D Keys to Well-Being, you'll know that the fifth key to well-being is the power and key of nature. Just being in nature is so important, and it's just a really cool opportunity to like disconnect from the stresses of life and reconnect with your soul, doing it through nature, which is what we're a part of.
When you reconnect with nature, it helps you reconnect with the truth of who you are, which helps you to reconnect with your power. And reconnect with you and your heart, and that's when you're tapped back into your heart. That's you unlocking that soul and your well-being so that you can then lead better from that place.
Michael Leytem: I wanna talk about something that you brought up with leaders. So we know that there's an increased need in organization for mindfulness and well-being. People are struggling out there. I mean, there's some pretty staggering statistics I can share with you here in a minute, but I think you all know it. And maybe you can recognize within yourself that maybe the last couple years have been difficult for you.
But so often what we run into when we go and we talk about the need for mindfulness is, well, we have an app that we give out to our employees, the calm app or whatever one it is, or we bring in a lunch and learn. We have a wellness speaker come in for a lunch and learn. But to Alisha’s point, if the leaders aren't actually changing, none of it really matters because behavioral change takes time and it needs to be integrated into the culture.
This opportunity to physically show up, go to a retreat, learn some things, and come back and implement them within your organizations, within your teams, is gonna be so much more impactful than just doing like a lunch and learn or having another speaker come in. So there are very many ways to be strategic in the way that you want to implement mindfulness and wellbeing within your organizations, but it is important that leaders are bought in and are practicing what they preach.
So I shared these at a keynote that I did earlier this month for a bunch of HR professionals out on the west coast. But these all came from the U.S. Surgeon General, the list of their priorities in 2022. So the first one is 76% of US workers reported at least one symptom of a mental health condition. So over three out of four people are experiencing at least one mental health condition. A mental health condition could be depression, anxiety, could be stress, I mean, but it's just, it's something.
That's a staggering number. The next one is 84% of respondents said their workplace conditions had contributed to at least one mental health challenge. So if you're spending over a 30 year life at work, whether you're working from home or in a physical office, it doesn't matter, a lot of your time is going to be dedicated to the work that you're doing and the individuals that you work around.
I think we need to do a better job at creating workplaces that are psychologically safe, that promote well-being. If people are saying that they're experiencing a lot of these negative outcomes. Here's another one. 81% of workers reported that they will be looking for workplaces that support mental health in the future. 81%.
So you hear about how there's a war for talent. That there aren't enough really talented employees for all the positions that companies want. You wanna have a differentiator walk the walk when it comes to creating an organization that supports well-being and mindfulness, that's gonna be a differentiator. Especially with younger, high potential employees, they will refuse to go work for companies that are too stuffy and say, this is the way it's always been done, and it's a work hard, play hard culture. Just go with it. It's not gonna work anymore.
Alisha Leytem: Or even just not prioritizing it. I think that's another one too. It's I'm seeing that there are companies that aren't like that anymore, where they're like, oh, this is the way it's always been. We care about your health and well-being, but they don't actually do anything to back that up.
Saying one thing and doing another, I think it's, it's making sure you have something to back up what it is that you're saying is a priority. And again, like leaders have the opportunity to lean into it. And who honestly, who doesn't wanna feel really good, that's my definition of well-being. You feel good. You feel good physically, you feel good mentally, you feel good spiritually. You love your life, you're thriving, like who doesn't wanna thrive?
When you're thriving in your personal life, you're thriving way more in your, in your work life. That's just how it works and one will impact the other positively or negatively. And so I just think that there's this really cool opportunity to like, feel good and do live the best life you wanna live.
Michael Leytem: Yes. I love the way that you said that too. It's so much passion. It's started to make it started to make me feel good. Last statistic for you, 76% of workers reported that their managers had the greatest impact on their mental health on par with the impact of their partner.
So think about that. Managers, we know that managers have a ton of influence when it comes to employee engagement and how well an employee feels integrated into the culture, but they have a direct impact on the mental health on par with a person's partner. So it's absolutely imperative that we're training these managers to be the first line of defense to promote and defend against unhealthy wellbeing and, you know, non mindful behaviors.
You can look at all the statistics yourself. There's so much out there right now. I think our point is pretty strong on why this is important, but there's still an uphill battle in getting people to lean into change. Because when you don't necessarily know what mindfulness is, or you think, oh man, this is gonna be something I'm uncomfortable with, or I don't practice yoga. There are so many different ways to become more mindful as a leader, you have to start leaning into whatever ways best serve you.
Alisha Leytem: So, so let's get into two things. We're gonna talk about what is mindfulness, what it is at its core, and then the benefits of nature because this is a a retreat for leaders to become more mindful in nature. Then we'll share with you what we're gonna be doing at this retreat. We'll wrap it up.
So what is mindfulness? Mindfulness is the practice of being present in the moment and what it is that you're doing. It's a way to, to be present without judging the moment and wishing that it were something different other than what it is. It's a way to be in the moment without stressing about the future or worrying about the past.
So this is an ongoing practice by doing that, it helps you find your center, it helps you to release stress improve focus absolutely reduces anxiety and just increases your overall well-being. There's a lot of different ways that you can actively practice being more mindful. But mindfulness in and of itself is being able to be here right now without wishing or judging that it were something other than what it is.
Taking yourself out of the future, forgiving and releasing the past, and bringing all of your presence and energy into the here and the now. Can you just imagine if you're operating from that place, how much more power you're bringing to the moment that you're in and how this can help you in anything that you're doing in your, in your life at home and in your career. This also is what helps you to do more with less because then you're able to bring more energy to what it is you're doing with less time and resources and energy overall.
Michael Leytem: Sometimes the way I think about it is what is maybe the opposite of mindfulness. I think about distractions. So if you're constantly getting blown up with alerts on your phone or these thoughts that are about the future or the past, like Alisha said, but you're not actually focused on the moment, all of those are distractions, right?
You're never gonna be able to eliminate them completely. Nor would I say that a leader should just put blinders on and say, I'm being mindful, I just can't deal with anything. But it's about being intentional of when you are trying to bring some more mindfulness into what you're doing at any given moment. And yes, there will be times where you'll have to put out fires, but so many of us just go about our day reactively, or we wear devices that are just constantly blowing up and now my attention is going here and I'm not being mindful on what I was.
Then you just feel exhausted. You feel burnt out because your mental load has just been fight or flight all day long. Distraction, distraction, distraction. So mindfulness is kind of the opposite of that. Maybe focusing on one thing. And it also embodies elements of gratitude when you can be happy in the present moment. I mean, there's a saying that happiness can really only be experienced in the present moment. You can't be happy about the future or happy about the past. You can only feel happiness as an emotion right now.
Alisha Leytem: Tthis conversation around mindfulness has been coming up with our daughter. So there's this new show that we discovered, it's the coolest show ever. It's called Stillwater. And you can watch it on Apple TV. There's this episode in there where these, these kids want to go on a mindful walk in the winter. So they decide, all right, we're gonna take this very serious mindful walk. We're gonna look at the trees and touch the snow and breathe in the crisp air. Just being seriously mindful.
Then Stillwater, who is a big panda, he's out in the corner making a snow angel. And one of the kids was like, man, now you're goofing off. We were supposed to be taking this mindful winter walk. And Stillwater the panda was like, you are being mindful is also having fun and just being in the moment and enjoying yourself.
It doesn't have to be this very serious dire thing. Mindfulness is also joy and experiencing, like Michael just said in the moment, which is why taking a time out with a retreat isn't like this serious silent meditation retreat.
It's just being in it and enjoying it and practicing, like letting everything else go and just being there for what it is that you're there for, which is to release what's holding you back so that you can step into the authentic truth and your personal power. So check out that show. Our daughter's been loving it lately, as have I.
Michael Leytem: I think she's watching it right now. Which is great because we're talking about mindfulness and she's a little two year old who's getting her own. Yeah, I think she is. That's why it's so quiet.
Alisha Leytem: Let's just talk really quickly about some of the benefits of, of nature. You know, being outside in nature has so many benefits via mental and your physical health. Michael has a couple of cool statistics about practicing fishing in nature, which they call it fish therapy, which he can chat on here in a second.
But studies have found that spending time in nature can reduce stress and anxiety, improve your mood, and even boost the immune system, which I wrote about in my book in the, the fifth key of nature that even just being in surrounded by trees, you're breathing in the oils released from the trees and this is positively impacting your gut health, which is how it improves the immune system. So it's pretty cool what it does just being out and about in nature. But what about fish therapy?
Michael Leytem: So I didn't know this was an actual thing and I'm glad it's a thing and it's not just a product of my imagination, but there is an actual therapy called fish therapy and it's used primarily to treat people with PTSD, veterans with PTSD.
My modality, you know, my method of tapping into fish therapy is through fly fishing because it just kind of takes everything to the next level. It's more of a challenge, but you have to be more immersed. You have to be more mindful and observe what's going on in the environment and you really have to focus on your casting.
So it just allows your mind to think about one thing and not be distracted by a million different thoughts or other things. But fish therapy has been shown to drastically reduce stress and anxiety in these individuals.
It also has benefits when it comes to just physical activity. You talked about, you know, movement in how important movement is, and it can burn up to to 600 calories per hour depending on where you're hiking into and, and what you're doing. But you don't even think about it.
You spend a couple hours out in the water, you're getting physical activity, you're getting some negative ions, which we've talked about before, from the water breathing in fresh air. You're in a green space, you're also in blue space because you're next to water.
So there's so many benefits to your immune health, your physical health, your mental health by getting out there and being in some fish therapy. And I notice from a personal standpoint that if I've had a busy work week or I have things that have built up pressures in my life, I mean, you speak for it.
When I come back home after I've gone fishing sometimes I don't even catch any fish, you know, but I'm typically in a much better place mentally. So that's another element of this mindfulness retreat. You don't have to worry about it if you're not a big angler yourself, but one of the activities that I will be leading during the mindfulness retreat will be fly fishing activities, but there'll be other nature walks, hiking, we'll do some meditation, we'll do some yoga.
We will soak in as much sun as we can and kind of allow nature to reset us and tune into whatever the lessons that we need to learn are and give ourselves some grace for the good job that we're doing. And not just be running around and I'm wasting the weekend, but truly just to listen both to the outside nature world, but also internally too.
Alisha Leytem: Yes, very well said. It's combining mindfulness in nature is just a really powerful combination to help you escape and leave the crushing high demands that you are having at work so that you can just spend a few days recharging, refocusing, reconnecting investing some time and energy and resources into your own personal development and your own personal growth and doing it in a gentle, empowering way in nature.
So like Michael said, we'll be teaching and leading. Michael will be on a lot of leadership principles and we'll have some really cool workshops around his teachings on, on catching leadership. So combining leadership with fishing, there'll be some fly fishing opportunities. It's not required, but it's definitely an option that you want to, you definitely want it you can do at the retreat.
Michael Leytem: How cool is it to say, I went on this mindfulness retreat and I even went fly fishing. Maybe we catch fish, maybe we don't, but you can learn a new skill, you'll be proud of yourself for trying.
Alisha Leytem: Totally. And and that's part of the growth, the personal development is putting yourself into new situations where you're going to learn. And so Michael will be teaching what mindfulness and leadership and action is through some fly fishing experiences.
I'll also be leading some mindfulness sessions, myself and well-being sessions. I'll be guiding you through some guided meditations. And don't be worried if you've never meditated before, if I'm honest, these days. Any time I lead a meditation for a workshop or a client or a corporate team, it's basically 90% of theirs first meditation ever. If you have never meditated before, you are in great hands. If you have, then you can just deepen your meditation practice with us by doing out in nature. I'll also be offering some yoga sessions in the morning. This is super simple.
All levels, again, not required, but if you want to tap into that with us, you can. Then I'll also be leading us through a mindful walk in the woods. So this is also known as a forest therapy session. So using the benefits of the trees and all of our senses to mindfully go on this forest therapy walk.
Michael Leytem: Then just to add to it, those are the kind of mindfulness activities to allow yourself to get all those benefits we've been talking about. But there will be some group leadership coaching too. We will have some real examples and help each other out because there will be a group, and I should probably explain that there are six cabins that are available.
So every leader who comes to this event can have their own personal space. So there'll be some downtime as well, because that is part of well-being. It's not just let's jam pack as much as we possibly can, but let's give you some time to, to maybe rest, sleep in a little bit or journal or read a book. You wanna bring a book and just get some time for yourself. So there are six individual cabins and if you wanna bring a a friend, there's an option to share a cabin with someone too.
So just keep that in mind. There's an early bird that's running through April 15th, so if you wanna lock that in, I would encourage you to do that before April 15th. You can save 25% as well.
One other thing too, we were talking about nature. So this is from the keynote I did before. It's another kind of statistic here. So the question is how much we're busy, right? People have families, they have jobs, they're like, but, but how much do I need to get that maximum benefit?
A lot of research is saying between 120 and 150 minutes. So you're kind of a week. So you're looking at kind of a two, two and a half hour-ish timeframe to get out there. And it doesn't have to all be in one day, but try and aim for that if you want to get the benefits of being out in nature.
Alisha Leytem: Yeah, I have that, that a similar stat in my chapter in the book too, around that spending at least 30 minutes a day or if you have to jam it all in on the weekend, which is okay. You can do that and you'll still get the benefits, the lasting benefits of that for a few weeks even thereafter.
Michael Leytem: Think about there's a lot of individuals who just never leave their homes. Or the workplaces and like it just can start to really add up. Especially in the wintertime. So you just have to find whatever it is, whatever way, whatever season it is for you to, to make it a priority. Luckily for us it'll be June. So the weather's gonna be really nice at this retreat. And we'll be able to do a lot of different things out in nature.
Alisha Leytem: Yeah. So the other exciting thing about those who enroll is we're offering a bonus. So the bonus is you get access to both mine and Michael's online masterclass. So you get instant immediate access to this once you enroll in the retreat. And so this is something that I would actually recommend that you take and go through both of the master classes before coming to the retreat.
If you have enough time beforehand, like it's, by the time this episode comes out, it'll be early April, end of March. So if you sign up early enough, you'll have enough time with that. But you have unlimited access to both of the masterclass. So mine is on the Six G.O.L.D Keys to Well-Being. So I have one module per key in my framework to wellbeing to really help you unlock the foundation to your own personal wellbeing. And then Michael's is very cool too.
Michael Leytem: Yeah. So my team put together a really interactive and, and cool online platform for the, the masterclass. And it's all around catch and release, which are the six steps in catching leadership. So there's a ton of knowledge if you're not like much of a book reader if you will. This is basically like accelerating all of the key and core lessons from the book in a 90 to maybe two hour 90 minute to two hour kind of timeframe there. So incredible value. It will definitely jumpstart and make the retreat that much more impactful for you as well.
Alisha Leytem: Yeah. It's gonna be super awesome. And then they get coaching sessions, right?
Michael Leytem: Yeah. So there'll be a pre-coaching session that you get. Part of that is, is much benefit to me because I want to know what topics you want to talk about, what you are working on so that I can create the activities and we can kind of think about maybe who to pair people up with.
All of that helps us as we plan out the, the agenda for the retreat. But also you get the benefit of working one-on-one with coach. I mean, for some of you, maybe you've never worked with the coach one-on-one, but you'd be surprised how quickly Alisha and I are able to provide value to you and to really listen and help you tackle maybe one or two things because there may be a number of different things going on in your work or personal life. But can we just get the ball rolling on maybe one or two so you'll get a chance to speak with one of us before you go.
Then there will be group coaching sessions built into the agenda during the retreat in addition to maybe one of the best parts. We haven't talked about all of these home-cooked meals as well. We're gonna be eating really well. Alisha is a phenomenal cook and we'll make sure that you're taken care of so that all you have to do is just show up.
Show up and let everything else go. I mean, I know that you probably wanna check your phone at some times, but I, you could just turn it off for a couple days and just like, just be. We want to create that type of atmosphere for you. So that's kind of in a nutshell. There's a ton more information at catchingleadership.com. We can share the links in the description below here. And we just invite you to really challenge yourself to lean into something new.
If you're seeking behavioral change, you know that this is an area of your life that you need help with and you need it to kind of jumpstar.
If you're maybe nervous or afraid and maybe don't want to do it by yourself, bring someone else along, maybe bring your significant other along who's dragging their feet because we know healthy habits are a lot easier to get started when you're both working in unison together.
So anyway, I'm done with my spiel. I'm obviously very happy and excited for what we're gonna create for people.
Alisha Leytem: Yeah, it's gonna be a really, really great experience. So if you feel any inclination towards it, just trust yourself. Please feel free to reach out to Michael or I if you have any questions or you just wanna talk through some of the logistics or any of your hesitations around it, just please reach out to us with that so we can talk it through with you guys.
I think we, we shared all the details about it. Again, head to catchingleadership.com to see more about the retreat and then that's where you can put your deposit in for your spot for you and your own cabin or you plus someone that you wanna share the cabin with. I will say the cabins are really cute and Oh, that's what I was gonna say. Yes. I will absolutely feed you all at this retreat.
I'm creating very high expectations now.
Michael Leytem: No, you always deliver on it. And people usually try new things and that's one of the things they really like about retreats.
Alisha Leytem: That's true. Oh, that's what I was gonna ask you. We ran into a couple people who attended this retreat last year mm-hmm. What did they tell you? One person told you something really great about it?
Michael Leytem: Well, there was a lot of things, but I think in particular they were just saying how there were a lot of things that still resonated that they learned from those sessions that they think about on a regular basis. And there are a couple people who said that they did try some of the new food and we try and bring like really good organic stuff. You might not love everything, but you'd be surprised at some of the quote unquote health food that is actually really well prepared.
It goes back to what Alisha was saying, like when you start feeling good, you feel good about the foods you're eating, you take time to recharge in nature, you're moving your body. You have more clarity on what you're trying to do as a leader or as a leader within your own family or household, whatever that is for you.
You just leave with some positive energy that then you feel like, okay, I can do this. Of course, mindfulness and well-being is an ongoing practice. So this, again, look at it as a way to jumpstart if you're new to it or if you've been practicing mindfulness but you kind of fell off the wagon a little bit or you're just like, I just need a reset. I need a revamp.
Alisha Leytem: Yes.
Michael Leytem: Perfect time to do it.
Alisha Leytem: Yes. That's how I see it as I think it'll be, it'll be the perfect reset and like refocused and feel recharged and like ready to go back to your life and work just feeling like you had this, you know, burst of, of energy and intention and like, I know why I'm here, which is one of the best feelings ever, I feel like.
So thank you guys so much for tuning in and listening to us jam. Hopefully you got some good nuggets of information about how mindfulness can help you as leaders in this landscape of the changing workforce with well-being.
So we have new episodes for this podcast every Friday. If you are not yet subscribed, please subscribe and feel free to leave us a five star review with a written review on iTunes. That would be really cool.
Michael and I are both active over on LinkedIn, so find us on LinkedIn. We always have the links for that in the show notes, so you can add us both over there. We also have our business pages over there too, and we look forward to connecting with y'all.
Michael Leytem: I gotta say one last thing on the LinkedIn piece. Thank you for bringing it up. No, we're on it. I mean, we're not on like TikTok and we kind of limit some of our other socials, but like LinkedIn especially given what we do in trying to bring well-being and mindfulness to organizations.
But this is also a great opportunity if your organization is looking to potentially do something like this in the future for their leadership team. Send a person to our retreat here as a pilot. See what you like, see what would fly, what might not fly or how we could modify it. And if it is something that they would be open to doing, let's say in 2024, now you, you already have the relationship with us, you have a positive experience and we can really start to get to work for your organization beyond just your own personal benefit.
Alisha Leytem: Yep. Love it. Great plug and reminder.
Michael Leytem: You said LinkedIn, so that's where my mind's at
Alisha Leytem: All right. Thank you guys for tuning in. We will see you next time and maybe we'll have Michael back on again. I feel like this is your third or fourth.
Michael Leytem: Oh no, I have to say the classic thing, which is, well, hopefully I did a good enough job for Alicia. She'll invite me back on
Alisha Leytem: Again. I think that's what you say every time.
Michael Leytem: All right. I'll just say tight lines.
Alisha Leytem: Tight lines. All right. And I say namaste. Bye.
Michael Leytem: Bye everyone.
